


Drunk Memories

by aceofneverland



Series: rift & vortex one shots [2]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Torchwood
Genre: (Verbal & Neglect), (implied) - Freeform, Abusive Parents, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Cancer, Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Homophobia, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mentions of Cancer, Minor Character Death, Parental Death, Smoking, Toxic Masculinity, shitty parents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:33:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26205733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceofneverland/pseuds/aceofneverland
Summary: After his mother's funeral, Ianto Jones is left thinking back on his relations with his family.  He has alcohol for company and comfort as he tries to cope with it.** can be read on its own!
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones, Lisa Hallett/Ianto Jones (mentioned)
Series: rift & vortex one shots [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2004661
Comments: 6
Kudos: 67





	Drunk Memories

**Author's Note:**

> I pull heavily from the show & the audios Broken and The Last Beacon. I take some inspiration from Torchwood One audios, though take a lot of liberties.
> 
> I place this after the episode Combat. If you haven't read the tags - Ianto's childhood is not nice. His father was abusive, and his mother was negligent. This will not be a fun time, even if he does get comfort.

Ianto hadn't been there when his father had died. In fact, he'd ignored his father's call in those weeks. He knew what his father was going to say, and he didn't want apologies/ He didn't want to be asked to forgive everything. After trying to hard, after being the reason his father even had a roof over his head in London - Ianto didn't want to hear it. Because he'd ran from his father, only to be saddled with the responsibility of him once again. Because his father never changed, and he never had been enough. So, he'd let the calls go to voicemail. It was in his weekly call with his mother that she'd told him his father had passed. Ianto was more upset about the pain in his mother's voice and the fact that his father had left her a second time than the actual death.

He was there when his mother died, though. He'd watched it go from just a routine check-up to more. He watched her get sicker and sicker. It'd reminded him of Lisa, when the memories of Lisa were still fresh enough to cut deep. Sitting and watching your loved one die slowly and not being able to stop it. He visited as many days as he could after work - her house and then the hospital when things got really bad. He'd hold her hand and talk, though she did most of the talking. When he avoided questions about work or his life, she would start talking about the memories. 

She only wanted to talk about the good, and he couldn't deny her that wish. After years of burying those memories under the pain, it was a breath of fresh air to remember that it wasn't all bad. For the first time since he could remember, he felt like he was finally letting his mother in. After years of her calling, of her trying to make up for everything, he was finally letting it happen. As she was dying. He sat by her bedside and let her talk about when it had been good.

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

_He remembered running around Debenhams after his father when he was a kid. He couldn't have been more than five or six, but the memory was still there. Hiding in the clothes racks or watching his father take measurements. Before dad had been fired. Before Ianto realized dads weren't supposed to pass out on the couch every night. Before his dad began distinguishing what was a "man's job."_

_There were the trips to the cinema - every month when the cinema hosted a classic film day. He and Rhiannon would eat enough popcorn to spoil their dinner, and mom and dad would let them. It was their treat for the month. Until money got too tight to go anymore, and dad decided that they were too old for such family outing anyway._

_Mom's favorite was always talking about Fridays. How Ianto would run home from school to pack a bag for their trip to Nan's, jabbering about all the things he wanted to do and how she'd be so proud of all the things he could say in Welsh now. When he was still in primary, she would help him pack while he talked and he didn't think about how the bottles in the fridge were drunk by both her and dad._

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

Glenda Jones' funeral was small. Her parents dead, and ... well, it was just Ianto, Rhiannon, and Rhiannon's family left. Dad's family hadn't been in touch since long before dad died anyway. It was awkward and stilted in the graveyard, where she was being buried next to her husband. Years of not truly talking had caught up to Ianto and Rhiannon long ago. Hell, the last time he'd seen her in person had to be just after Mica was born. And even then, well, there was seeing someone and actually talking. 

Johnny was worse at keeping the frustration from his face. Rhiannon had greeted Ianto with a tight smile, and he could see that she was trying to make an attempt. He'd been there for mom after all. Even if it had only been in the last few months. And six years of missed class and distance not just in miles went both ways. Johnny couldn't mask the anger though. He could see Rhiannon's own anger on Johnny's face.

The funeral, while small and tense, was what mom would have wanted. Her family together, finally, after years of excuses and near misses. He couldn't remember the last time they'd all had dinner together. Before London, that was for sure. Even on her deathbed, his mom had never mentioned it. She'd never blamed him for leaving, or lamented about the missed years. He suspected that made it hurt more. The guilt lingered in his heart. It stung to think she understood that he'd felt just as abandoned by them.

There were no drawn-out speeches, and after the service, he went back to his empty apartment. The boxes that had been filling the place for months on end were mostly gone now. He'd finally started getting rid of them the night his mother had called and told him about the lump. Well, not that night. That night had been filled with other things he'd never let himself fully imagine until they were on top of him. Quite literally. But after that he'd started unpacking them all. Lisa's things that couldn't be classified as mementos went to charity. He'd have more boxes in a couple days, when mom's things were divided up between him and Rhiannon. That wasn't a problem for that night though.

The sun had already set, and it was inching from evening to night. The service had been late, so Ianto only had to take a half-day and Rhiannon didn't have to call off at all. If he was in the mood to laugh, he might find it funny that even his mother's funeral had been made to accommodate their work lives. 

He kept the lights off as he dropped onto the couch. The gin and tonic he set on the table beside a glass was far too large for anyone not trying to get wasted. The city lights streaming through the window might have been pretty if the window itself wasn't old and grimy. But the apartment was all Ianto had been able to afford when most of his money was going to keeping Lisa alive. And then his mother.

He took a long sip out of the glass, savoring in the way that the alcohol stung on the way down. He knew what do with pain. He knew how he was supposed to handle pain. It's what he'd lived on when he buried the good memories. He'd thought that in forcing himself to see his father's failures, he'd been seeing the truth. He thought he'd been right to let himself soak in that pain. But after Lisa, and in the months sitting by his mother's bed, he thought maybe he was wrong. Pain only made you angry, it only made you forget everything good in the world. It made you think everyone was a monster. 

But sitting on the couch, looking out at the city that was slowly becoming home again, he wasn't sure. It was messy and complicated, and he doubted he'd find the answers at the bottom of his drink. But alcohol had always loosened his mind enough for memories he'd long suppressed to come back to the surface.

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

_There wasn't really an exact date that he started figuring out his parents left a lot to be desired. It was a series of events that slowly added together. It was before The Birthday Party (as Ianto dubbed it). Because by that point his parents had already been fighting about alcohol and responsibility, and Rhiannon was already cleaning up the beer bottles left around the place. It was well after he'd broken his leg, though. Or had his leg broken. He still couldn't remember exactly what had happened, if it had been his fault or his dad's._

_If he had to wager a guess, Derec's tenth birthday party was the start of it all. Derec's parents ... well, they were a lot different than his own. They sat together, held hands and spoke softly to one another. Derec's mom had made the cake, and his dad had led a scavenger hunt through the back garden. Ianto had thought the difference was because Derec had a big house and his mother didn't have to work, while the Joneses lived in a two-bedroom flat, mom had to work two jobs, and Rhiannon's babysitting money went to helping with food. But Mari lived in a tiny house, and her parents were the same._

_It had been Nan who convinced mom to let him go on the camping trip Mari's parents organized when he was twelve. Mari's parents were a lot like Derec's. They smiled at each other and didn't raise their voices. They pulled Mari aside when Ianto was sure she was going to get yelled at. It was nothing like the time when he'd broken a glass while his friends were over, and dad had yelled at him for what had felt like an hour while his friends slinked back to the room he and Rhiannon shared._

_That was the same year as The Birthday Party. Dad had come home in the middle of it, stumbling and reeking of beer and tobacco. Mom had been drinking, but she wasn't drunk yet. She wouldn't rely on that until Ianto was a teen. Derec had gotten Ianto_ Pulp Fiction _on VHS and he and his friends were crowded around the tiny tv, trying to watch the movie that was probably too old for them but Derec's brother had taken him to get it._

_It really didn't matter, because they couldn't hear the movie over the yelling. Ianto could still remember it, if not word for word. Screaming about how dad was always home late, and about lipstick stains on his shirts. Arguing about the smoking and the drinking and the money. About how dad couldn't keep a job, but mom was barely keeping the one at the grocery store._

_More food ended up on the floor that birthday party than in stomachs. Derec didn't talk to him after that, and Mari had too much pity for them to be proper friends. That was alright though. Derec and Mari wouldn't have had the same tastes as Ianto in secondary anyway. If they hadn't distanced themselves then, it would have only been a matter of time before he would have shoved them all away anyway._

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

Ianto sent Tosh's call to voicemail. He knew what it was. She was calling to ask him how it went, or how he was doing. And he didn't want to answer those questions. 

Her and Jack were the ones who knew why he'd left before anyone else that day. Jack partially because he was the boss, but more so because Ianto had _wanted_ to tell him. Like he'd wanted to tell Tosh. They'd both offered to go with him. He'd used the excuse that being two hands down wasn't ever a good idea. They'd both offered to keep him company after as well, but he didn't want that. It was the same reason he hadn't even thought about telling Gwen why he was leaving early. He didn't want the pity. Pity did no one any good.

Alcohol. Now, alcohol was doing him good. He started his third glass, sinking back into his couch more.

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

_Visiting Nan had always been his favorite part of the week. As he got older, his friends thought it was weird that he was excited to go to the countryside and hang out with old folks. They were only anti-establishment until everything started smelling like grass and manure. As his friends questioned it more, though, he understood more and more why he loved it._

_He loved his Nan. He loved getting away from the city and into fresh air. He loved the way the locals smiled whenever him and Rhiannon were around and asked how their mother was. But the thing he loved most was the older he got, the less dad came with them. By the time he was eight, dad rarely showed up. Which meant it was_ his _time. Ianto loved that the only alcohol in the house was cheap wine for cooking, and that Nan had quit smoking around the time he was born. It couldn't have been more different than home. Smells didn't cling to the rooms, unless it was the smell of baked goods, or Nan's perfume, or the fresh herbs she had them pick for her. No one raised their voice. The only sound that ever carried was Nan singing along to old records of Shirley Bassey._

_Nan never questioned Ianto the way that dad did. She never told him what kind of job he should go for. When he was young, she'd dance around the living room with him and they'd sing to what Nan called 'the good music.' Or they'd sit by the fire, and Ianto would tell her stories of school while she knitted. And when he was older, she never asked him about the studded belts or why he nicked Rhiannon's black nail polish. He'd talk about Zeal or Green Day or Bad Religion, and how they were better than the crap on the radio. She never understood, and he doubted she would have liked the bands. But she nodded and smiled and let him talk._

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

He wasn't sure if it was his fourth or fifth glass when he got the text from Rhiannon. It was about Mica's upcoming birthday party. His chest ached when he looked at it, and he promptly chucked his phone to the other end of the couch where he was sure it would get lost. He didn't feel like coming up with an excuse for why he couldn't make it. Not when his mind was floating in and out. Not now.

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

_It'd been a long time since Ianto and Rhiannon had been close. If he had to choose a year, he'd pick when he was 14 and she was 18. She'd stayed home, saying it was just until she had a steady job to support herself. They all knew it was because dad had gotten fired five months earlier and mom's jobs had never been enough. It was the year that Ianto started looking forward._

_In the dark of night, he and Rhiannon would sit. Sometimes on their beds, sometimes against the wall between their beds. Still huddling together like children when the voices from the other rooms got too loud. He would talk about leaving - going to London or Manchester or Liverpool or Newport. Anywhere that wasn't here. Anywhere that was away from dad and friends who barely knew him and spending lunches with the kids who got high out back._

_She didn't like it when he talked like that. She never said as much aloud, but he could feel the judgment in the darkness. Because she'd chosen to stay, to help mom. And Ianto couldn't. He couldn't because dad's anger was directed at him more than Rhiannon. Because he wasn't supposed to like history more than maths. He was supposed to 'be a man.' He wasn't supposed to knick Rhiannon's eyeliner or hang around those 'no good punks.'_

_Because Nan had died and there were no more weekend breaks to keep him excited._

_Sometimes, he thought, she didn't expect him to actually leave. That she had thought it was all talk, and after his gcse's he'd get a job in cardiff and stick around. he did stay in cardiff for another two years after he moved out of his parent's home. he worked at a cafe, while he and his friends tried to keep up on rent of a flat that was holding far too many people in it. while his friends and interests and beliefs had been slowly pushing them apart, Ianto suspected that it was his leaving that had finally fractured him and Rhiannon._

_He doubted she ever really understood the pressure he felt in that house. No one ever talked about how Rhiannon should get a 'more appropriate job' or how she dressed or who her friends were. She wasn't expected to make up for all their mother's mistakes. Ianto never wanted to just be a better version of his father. Rhiannon didn't get that, and he never explained._

_And truth be told, the phone calls went both ways._

_⟨⟨ ✧ ⟩⟩_

He knew he was far too drunk when he realized he'd never heard the door unlock, and he wondered if it was bad that he knew it was Jack just by the way he was touching Ianto's face. He wasn't sure when he'd closed his eyes or slumped down further into his couch. But he was blinking up, trying to merge the hazy images of Jack into one. He curled into Jack's touch, in a way he didn't always let himself. Because he wasn't sure if Jack was staying. Because he was scared that he was falling fast and hard for the other man, who was still so much of a mystery to him.

But he let himself turn his head and nuzzle into Jack's hand tonight. He let himself sit up only to grab ahold of Jack and bury his face in Jack's shoulder. Jack didn't say anything. He didn't have to. He just held Ianto. Touched him. Surrounded him in warmth. Truthfully, Ianto hadn't known how starved he'd been of touch until he and Jack had started this. He'd had Lisa, for a short but beautiful time. He'd given his heart to her, but he'd still been closed off. Running from his past, cursing his father and the dingy flat that _Ianto_ paid for. With Jack - well Jack had seen him at his worst, and there was really nothing else to hide.

He'd gone to Jack, broken and held together by scotch tape. And Jack had held him and touched him in ways he'd never had before. In ways that sunk into his cracks and filled them with cotton before stitching him back together. Sex with Jack was great, _innovative_ , but just holding and touching. That was what had been revolutionary for Ianto. It wasn't the harshness of his father, or the coldness of his mother before she'd quit drinking. It wasn't the constant giving it had been with Lisa. Jack gave as much warmth as he received. He taught Ianto what it was like to _love_ being touched again. And tonight, tonight Ianto was going to let himself have this.

"He would have hated you," he mumbled. His words were slurred and quiet, to the point where he wasn't even sure if Jack had heard him. 

"Who?" 

"M'tad. Would've hated you. Probably would've said you made me a girl. Or a - a ..." He didn't even want to say the word. His father had thrown it around, especially when Jonah started coming around. "But mam. I think mam would have liked you."

"I'm quite the charmer with moms." 

Ianto let himself laugh, just a little. His head was still buried in Jack's shoulder though, and he thought he was shaking a little. He didn't whine when Jack pulled away, but he know he followed for a moment. Seeking out the heat and warmth he'd grown to know as _safe_. 

Jack stood and held his hands out to Ianto. Ianto barely pulled himself up, Jack doing most of the work and taking the brunt of his weight when he stumbled. The room spun around him but Jack's arms were warm around his waist and his shoulder was comfortable. 

"Let's get you to bed," Jack said, but Ianto barely heard it. He just hummed, content to do whatever Jack directed him to do. 

There was no rush or urgency as Jack stripped him down. There was no flirtation, and the lingering touches were ones that made Ianto feel like a puddle of goo rather than every hair on his body standing on edge. It took barely a push from Jack for Ianto to fall onto the bed, stripped to only his underwear. 

"Stay." He barely heard himself say it. The whisper floated in the room, hanging there between them. Broken. Fragile. Praying.

"Let me get undressed." Jack's response was as soft as Ianto's plea. A promise, or a vow. Words that neither of them had spoken, but Ianto knew were far too close to the surface for his comfort.

Jack urged Ianto under the covers before he followed. Ianto curled into him, searching for the comfort he knew only Jack could bring him. Because Jack wouldn't push him to talk or to open up, but he'd listen when Ianto finally did. And right now. Right now he just needed Jack arms and body heat. His steadiness. Jack was chaotic, a million miles a minute. But there was something so steady and strong about him. Like he'd been there for hundreds of years and would be for hundreds of more. Like you could always trust that he would be _right there_. Ianto'd never had that before. He'd never had someone he knew was going to stay.

His eyes fluttered shut when he felt Jack's lips press to his forehead, just below his hairline. He could feel sleep creeping in, a darkness at the edge of his eyes threatening to take over. And he let it. Because when he woke up Jack would be there, and all these memories would be back in their place buried in the depths of his mind.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to this post ( https://jantohaven.tumblr.com/post/166356215949/iantos-mother-glenda-jones ) for summarizing and contextualizing facts abut Glenda Jones. It really helped me situate a lot of my thoughts and ideas that hadn't yet been grounded.


End file.
